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MRS. A, I). TWlirrNE 




LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



WHITE MEMORIES 



WHITE MEMORIES 



BY 



Mrs. a. D. T. WHITNEY 




BOSTON AND NEW YORK 

HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 

^f)t Wamiiiz ^resjS, Camfiritise 

1893 



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>M0V^5 1893 J 






Copyright, 1893, 
By ADELINE D. T. WHITNEY. 

All rights reserved. 



The Riverside Press, Cambridge, Mass., U.S.A. 
Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton & Co. 



OF THREE 

WHO NEED NO MEMORIAL : 

BUT 

WHOM WE LOVE AND REMEMBER TOGETHER, 

AS HAVING BEEN NEAR 

IN PLACE AND FRIENDSHIP UPON THE EARTH, 

AND HAVING PASSED ON TOGETHER 

AS IF HAND IN HAND, 

INTO THE HEAVENLY PLACES. 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

PHILLIPS BROOKS . . . ' • 9 ^ 

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 13 

LUCY LARCOM 19 



PHILLIPS BROOKS 




PHILLIPS BROOKS 

USHED is the grandest utterance of 
earth. 
The strongest voice for God to men 
is stilled ; 
The world's thought so with such great death 
is filled, 
It loses conscience of the mightier birth. 

Brief leadership, and then — a silent bier ; 

A place left vacant that no man can take ; 

A corner-stone uprooted with earthquake : 
So seemeth it to have befallen here. 



Count we the other side .'' — God's days and years ? 

His ones and thousands ? and how spirit 
powers 

Once clothed in this humanity of ours, 
Inseparate, urge it forward through the spheres .'' 



PHILLIPS BROOKS 

When Christ was Hfted up, all men were drawn. 
All manhood in the Son of Man did rise 
With one ascending to the shining skies, 

Where the deep night was broken with great 
dawn. 

No smallest life can go without such hold 
On the dear common nature it hath known, 
Through something it has made its very own. 

As moves that something with a force untold. 

So earth throbs upward to the waiting heaven ; 

So each withdrawal is impulsion on ; 

And high departure is not helping gone, 
But tenfold grasp of tenfold strengthening given. 

We who have ever felt the pulse of him 
Quicken our own with its diviner thrill. 
Think we it fails, grows far, or faint, or chill, 

Because he stands among the seraphim ? 

Priest, prophet, king ! Death hath no touch of 
thee! 
Life, surging with thee, sweeps our spirits in 
Where thy new consecration doth begin, 

Bishop of souls, for Christ's eternity ! 



JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 




JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 

^NIGHT, Laureate, Lord, — no other 
name so high 
Of all the titles men may call men by ; 
No other word all else doth so tran- 
scend 
As that he simply chose and witnessed, — Friend. 

For "Friend" means one who can love bound- 
lessly. 
No small relation, just of you with me, 
May such a style and statelihood confer, 
Or gauge its sign to soul-diameter. 

"Friend" reaches all and holds all, draws all 

near, 
Is heart to heart with the whole rounded sphere 
15 



JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 

Of beautiful and wide reality : 

God's heaven, and earth, and dear humanity. 

So had he friendship ; so each thing was kin 
And comrade to his nature. Deep within 
He found its meaning, its sweet secret read, 
And with strong utterance interpreted. 

Suns, stars, and winds, mountains, and mighty 

seas, 
And singing streams, and upward lifting trees, 
And snows, and rains, and clouds, and blessed 

grass 
That makes earth pleasant for tired feet that 

pass, — 

All these were as a living part of him. 
What others felt remote with senses dim, 
Came to his spirit keen and all alight 
With apprehension of interior sight. 

So he was poet ; so translated them. 
As John revealed the New Jerusalem. 
With grasp of all, he touched the special ; wide 
His love of one, with all he loved beside. 
i6 



JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 

In such supreme capacity of mind 
His great affection gathered human kind : 
Fathered his race, like princely Abraham, 
Because as friend he walked with the I Am, 

He cared, as God cares, from the soul of good. 
For his beseeching, waiting brotherhood : 
He served as Christ serves, who from glory bends 
And tells his fishermen, I call you friends ! 
17 



LUCY LARCOM 




LUCY LARCOM 



'HO shall make, verse for her while her 
own verse 
Stands written of her ? Or who need 
rehearse 
The story, noble-sweet, herself hath told, 
Setting in silver lines its rounded gold ? 




Child of light, Lucy ! a fair valley combe 
Her quiet heart, where happy birds made home ; 
Sloping full eastward, so the larks took wing 
At quick sunrise, and wondrously did sing ; 
Long since her name revealed itself to me 
In such wise, without help of heraldry. 



It was her baptism for her errand here. 

Can her " new name " be lovelier ? Its cheer 



LUCY LARCOM 

Of syllables so rich, yet lowly meek, 
I think the angels will delight to speak. 

And she is with them. Her dear work remains, 
And follows, being one. Though higher strains 
Open her heaven-touched lips divinely now, 
She breathed their prelude for our hearts below — 
Lovely transcription of the theme that waits 
With its full harmony beyond the gates. 

All things of sweetness and delight were hers. 

In every line she worded, something stirs 

Of that which makes air fresh and sunshine 

fair. 
And life and truth a-blossom everywhere. 
Hers the clear vision that could always see 
In simplest form the central majesty; 
Herself so simple and sincere of soul. 
She read God's manuscript as open scroll. 

These things are true of royal human nature : 
Lowly to bow, one needs be high of stature ; 
Strong, to be gentle ; grand, to be truly meek : 
Such is the grace of which the Christ did speak. 



LUCY LARCOM 

This woman wore it all. Her spirit birth 

By spirit law inherited the earth. 

With quiet feet she walked her great domain 

By quiet ways, serenely straight and plain ; 

Yet failed not ever of her regal dues, 

But gathered, as she went, her revenues. 

And now, right on, beyond the bars of light 
Whose blaze shuts out our straining earthly 

sight, 
By that same path so reverently trod 
She passes to the very throne of God 
Whence her high beckonings made sign, to stand 
With sons and daughters at the King's right 

hand. 
And take the promise of the holy page 
That gives the blessed all their heritage : 

" Come, to your Father ! For this hour sublime 
The worlds were built, and all the signs of time 
Laid in their deep foundations. Ye believed 
Greatly, and greatly therefore have received. 
Freely ye gave ; your Lord gives freely, too ; 
Behold, His Kingdom is prepared for you ! " 
23 




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